Bar-barians Forum Challenge – Killin’ Gravity

Every month on the Bar-barians forum a new challenge is posted. Actually there are generally three: normal, hard and bar-baric modes. Every month I think about entering, but because my training schedule is so tight and the challenges so physically tough, I find it hard to schedule in actually doing them – it’s tricky to work both them and the recovery time into my routine.

Anyhow, this month it got right to the last minute – I’d meant to do them, but other training got in the way and I just let them drag. I happened to be doing some cooking (sweet potato chocolate brownies oh yeahhhh) and thought I’d have a go whilst waiting for them to finish. I’d done a 10km hill run that morning so wasn’t expecting to do particularly well, but if I’m honest I wanted mostly to beat Duf and to not come last – both of them seemed like achievable goals…

Normal was out – my shoulder injury precludes long periods of hanging. Hard was definitely go, and Bar-baric was an unknown quantity – I’ve been training dragon flag negatives, but not statics.

Hard mode was ok – tried twice, leg cramped up both times (damn running!) but got 38s which is ok.

Bar-baric was killer. I knew I had to beat 22s, preferably 23s as that would put me third to last. Tried twice and got around 20, so the third time I set my phone timer for 25s and just tried to hold it until the buzzer went. Which I did, although you can see the shakes starting towards the end!

However, thanks to our disadvantaged time zone, it left Duf with enough time to shoot another attempt, beat me with 28s, and also include a bit of friendly banter for me :)

I will be making more of an attempt to do forum challenges in the future – they are fun and the prospect that I might not be last is actually quite motivating.

Also, I realised that in all the back-and-forth with Duf I forgot to thank him for the t-shirt, which I’m wearing in the L-sit videos. A few months ago I found an old Sensible Soccer t-shirt whilst tidying up, so posted on Facebook to see if anyone wanted it. Duf said he did, so I posted it over to him. A few months later he asked if anyone wanted an Obama inauguration shirt, which of course I did, so he sent it over in return. Whilst it’s always sunny in Florida and you can wear t-shirts all year round, they are sadly kept for rare days and indoor use here in the UK. Anyhow, thank you very much Duf – it is very much appreciated. But don’t be under the impression that my gratitude will hinder my competitive streak ;)